


Grief

by overcastskeleton



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie), F/M, Fluff and Angst, Grief/Mourning, Miscarriage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-08
Updated: 2017-11-08
Packaged: 2019-01-30 23:46:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,364
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12663927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/overcastskeleton/pseuds/overcastskeleton
Summary: Loki and the reader hit a rough patch in their relationship following the death of their unborn daughter





	Grief

**Author's Note:**

> WARNING: This story contains mentions of miscarriage

_ “She’s hurt!” Natasha yelled. “We need to get her medical attention immediately.” _

 

_ You laid on the ground, barely conscious. Blood seeped from under your suit, turning the blue fabric black. _

 

_ “Where’s Banner?” Tony asked. “We could really use his help.”  _

 

_ Natasha shook her head. “He’s AWOL. We can’t worry about that, get (Y/N) out of here. NOW.”  _

 

_ One of Tony’s robots gently picked you up and headed for the nearest hospital outside of Sokovia, with Tony flying behind you.  _

 

_ “Help me! My friend, she got hurt!” Tony yelled, stepping out of his suit. “Please, she’s pregnant!”  _

 

_ A nurse ran to his aid, pulling a stretcher behind her, ignoring the robot standing behind Tony. “What happened to her?”  _

 

_ “She- she was trying to save a family and the building she was evacuating was shelled. She was thrown ten feet.” Tony explained as the machine lightly set you on the stretcher.  _

 

_ The nurse wheeled you down the hall. “She might have some internal bleeding, we’ll get her into surgery immediately.” _

 

_ He tried to follow you, but another nurse blocked his path. “We’ll need you to stay here and answer a few questions,” he said.  _

 

_ “Is she going to be okay?” Tony looked over the nurse’s shoulder to follow your movement.  _

 

_ “We can only hope for the best.” The nurse guided Tony back to the waiting room. “Now, are you the father of the baby?”  _

 

_ Tony opened his mouth to answer, when the doors were shoved open. Loki stormed in, his furious gaze swept the small the room. _

 

_ “Where is she?” He roared. “Where is my (Y/N)?”  _

 

_ “That’s the baby’s father.” Tony sank into a chair.  _

 

_ “How is she and how is my daughter?” Loki seized the nurse by the collar of his scrubs.  _

 

_ The nurse sputtered, looking to Tony for help.  _

 

_ “She’s in surgery.” Tony answered.  _

 

_ Loki dropped the man and rounded on Tony. “When did you get here?”  _

 

_ “Five minutes before you did.” Tony raked his hands through his hair.  _

 

_ “Is she going to be okay?” Loki asked.  _

 

_ The nurse stood to his feet and brushed the dirt off his clothes. “We won’t know until after the surgery. We could be dealing with severe internal bleeding.” _

 

_ “And when, pray tell, might that be?” Loki’s fingers tightened around the scepter. _

 

_ “A-a couple hours at most,” the nurse stammered.  _

 

_ Loki held the nervous nurse’s gaze a moment longer, before sinking into the chair next to Tony. “Well then, I guess we shall wait.”  _

 

_ Three hours later, a doctor rushed down the hallway, pulling off his surgical gloves. He pulled aside the nurse standing at the receptionist desk and whispered in her ear.  _

 

_ Loki stopped his pacing and watched the scene unfold in front of him. “What- what happened?”  _

 

_ The doctor approached him with sad eyes.  _

 

_ “No…” Loki whispered.  _

 

_ “Your wife, she is fine. She’ll need to stay off her feet for a little while.” He said quietly. _

 

_ Loki breathed a sigh of relief.  _

 

_ But the solace was premature.  _

 

_ “The baby-the baby didn’t make it. I’m sorry, we did everything we could have done to-” _

 

_ “No!” Loki yelled, power surged through him, knocking aside everything within a ten foot radius. “No! You fool she can’t be- she can’t be dead. You!” He pointed to Tony. “You should have told me the moment this happened so I could have taken her to Asgard.”  _

 

_ Loki’s magic rippled through the room, sending papers flying through the room.   _

 

_ “I could have saved her!”  _

 

“Dammit!” Loki yelled. “Dammit, damn it all!” He ran his hands through his tangled dark hair, trying to tear the thoughts from his head.

 

He told you, he told you not to go. That it was too dangerous. But you insisted, you begged and against his better judgment he let you leave. And Thor, he promised to protect you, he promised that no harm should touch you or your unborn child. He was just as much at fault as the damned shell that hit the building. 

 

“No!” He twirled his scepter high into the air and smashed it into the precious, wooden crib in the corner of the lavish nursery. 

 

Loki’s cries reverberated off of the walls as he destroyed the room he spent so much time trying to build. But now it would go to waste, serving as nothing but an empty talisman of grief and regret. 

 

“Brother.” A low voice came from behind him. 

 

Loki turned, murder glinting in his green eyes. “How dare you call me that after what you did?” He spoke low, venomously. “How dare you even stand before me?” 

 

“It was not my fault, what happened to her, Loki.” Thor said quietly. “I did my best-”

 

“Your best was not good enough!” Loki shouted. “She’s dead, because of you.  _ Dead _ . See what your best did.” 

 

Thor sighed. “There were things- circumstances beyond my control. And it pains me that you insinuate that I just stood aside and watched.” 

 

“Why did you encourage her to go?” Loki pointed the scepter at him. 

 

He rolled his eyes. “Loki, you know how stubborn (Y/N) is. Had I told her no, she would have still gone if she really wanted to.”

 

“I almost had her convinced, and then you swooped in and fucked everything up like you always do!” Loki swung the scepter at Thor. 

 

Thor hit the weak blow aside. “Brother believe me, I never meant for any harm to come to her.” 

 

“Why should I believe another word that comes out of that poisoned mouth of yours?” Loki slammed the end of the scepter into Thor’s solarplex. 

 

Thor held his chest, wheezing. “What do you gain from this, brother? Blaming everyone, pushing away the people who care for you?” 

 

“You betrayed me!” Loki shouted. “You took from me the very thing that I cared for the most.” 

 

Thor shoved Loki back. “Listen to yourself! You’re mad with grief. It wasn’t me that took her from you, it was Ultron.”

 

“Is it wrong, for a father to grieve the loss of his child?” Loki sank to his knees. “Is it wrong for him to want revenge on the one who took his firstborn from him?”

 

Thor put a hand on Loki’s shoulder. “I am not your enemy, Loki. I am your brother, I love you and I grieve with you.” 

 

“You will never know what it is like, to lose a part of your own flesh and blood.” Loki stared at the broken crib in front of him. “I hope you never feel this pain.” 

 

Thor knelt in front of his brother. “You need to talk to (Y/N). People were not meant to suffer alone.” 

 

“I can’t face her,” Loki whispered brokenly, “not now. She hates me, she thinks I abandoned her.” 

 

Thor shook his head. “I just visited the tower, she’s a mess, Loki, she needs you.” 

 

“Then, I will disappoint her once again.” Loki dipped his head in shame. 

 

**********

 

“And why should I go?” You asked bitterly, as Thor paced the floor in front of the living room couch. “I lost my daughter too, I don’t see him rushing over here to provide me comfort.”

 

Thor ran a hand through his blond hair and let out an exasperated sigh. “Lady (Y/N), my brother, he is not himself. Even if he were to come to provide comfort, he would do no better than a drunk.” 

 

“Company is still company.” You shrugged, running your finger over the brim of your coffee mug. 

 

He faced you, a scowl on his face. “This is not a joke. My brother, he drinks, he revels, he finds himself in the company of questionable people; all because he wants to forget.” 

 

“I can’t help him.” Your gaze went down to the brown dredges at the bottom of the mug.  “I wear her death on me like a billboard."

 

“You can, you’ve talked him out of his moods before-” 

 

“His moods were not brought on by the death of his unborn daughter.” You snapped. 

 

Thor’s face fell.

 

“I’m sorry,” you apologized. “I just don’t think I can talk him down from this.” 

 

“Would you please try?” Thor looked at you hopefully.

 

You looked away from his pleading eyes. 

 

“You’re the only hope he has left.” Thor squeezed your hand. “You’ve always been the only hope for him in this world. Think about it.” He left the room, giving your hand another reassuring squeeze. 

 

**********

 

Loki swayed around the room, clutching a bottle of whiskey in  his hand. 

 

The nursery was a mess. The crib was now in pieces, scattered across the floor. The drawers of the dresser were broken, the baby clothes tossed around the room with reckless abandon.

 

“You know, love.” Loki turned unsteadily on his feet. “I’m not quite sure I would have made a good father. What with all of this taking over the world and stuff. But rest assured everyone in Asgard would have adored you.” He raised his bottle. “Frigga Laufeyson, princess of Asgard.” He drank heartily.

 

“Frigga?" You raised an eyebrow. “I thought we agreed on Astrid.” 

 

Loki smiled drunkenly. “ _ You _ agreed on Astrid. I always wanted to name my daughter after my mother.” 

 

“You always loved her, sometimes I suspected more than you loved me.” You smiled sadly. 

 

Loki chugged the remainder of the bottle. “I loved you both equally, just in different ways.” 

 

“ _ Loved _ ?” You took a step into the room. 

 

He rolled his eyes. “Don’t be overdramatic, (Y/N).” 

 

“Says the one who locked himself in his daughter’s nursery, drinking the night away.” You scoffed. “That is, if you can still call it a nursery, you’ve destroyed most of it.”

 

“What’s the point, she’s never going to use it anyways.” Loki rummaged around in the wreckage for a half empty bottle he had left the day before.

 

“That was not your call to make!” You snapped. “You don’t get to just decide to destroy the nursery we worked so hard to build.”

 

Loki whirled around, almost falling off of his feet. “And what did you suppose we do? Leave the nursery here, let her haunt us? Or maybe save it for another child that we might possibly have, that is, if it even lives to take its first breath.” 

 

You slapped Loki across the face, sending him reeling across the room. 

 

He stared at you, holding his reddening cheek. 

 

“Fuck you Loki.” You spat. “Fuck you. You’re not the only one in pain, okay? The world doesn’t revolve around you. I lost my daughter too. And I have to live with the pain that I am the reason why I can’t hold her in my arms everyday.”

 

You wiped the angry tears from your eyes, and continued, your voice cracking. 

 

“And maybe, just maybe, I wanted to remember the beautiful daughter that we almost had. But now I can’t, because you’re a selfish bastard that destroyed the only thing I had left of her!” You hit Loki’s chest with your fist. 

 

“She was my daughter too! She was apart of me in a way that you will  _ never _ even begin to understand. And I lost that part of me. Do you know how that feels? Like there is a hole in my chest and it rips wider and wider every time I think about her, because it’s my fault that she’s dead!” You screamed. 

 

A loaded silence filled the room, punctuated every now and then by your ragged sobs. 

 

“I shouldn’t have gone on that mission.” You whispered. “I should have left with you when I had the chance. But I didn’t and that’s on me. It’s my fault she’s dead. I killed my daughter.” 

 

You sank to your knees amongst the tiny baby clothes and gathered them in your arms.

 

“I’m so sorry,” You cried into the tiny christening dress, your tears staining the silk fabric. “I killed our baby girl, I’m so sorry.” 

 

Loki wordlessly wrapped his arms around you. 

 

“I’m sorry,” you repeated, twisting your fingers into the fabric of his dirty shirt. “God I’m so sorry.” 

 

He held you closer to him, his shoulders shaking as he cried silent tears. 

 

Grief consumed the two of you, who for the first time in a month properly mourned the loss of your daughter. 

 

“She would have been beautiful.” Loki whispered. “And strong and brave, just like you.” He pressed his lips to your hair. “Not like me. The coward who hid from her mother for a month when she needed him the most.” 

 

You sniffled. “You’re not a coward.” 

 

“I blamed the world, I blamed Thor, I even blamed you,” Loki confessed. “I never took the time to blame myself.” 

 

“You are not the one to be blamed for this,” you insisted.

 

Loki shook his head. “Am I? I could have fought by your side, but I pouted in Asgard while you risked your life for the people that you loved. Had I fought by your side, who’s to say we wouldn’t still have our daughter right now.” 

 

You cupped his face with your hands and forced him to look at you. “We both made our mistakes, but we can’t ask ourselves those ‘what if’ questions. There is no way for us to turn back time and change our situation-”

 

“There is the Time Gem.” Loki pointed out. 

 

“We need to learn to live with what happened.” Your ran your thumb over the bags under Loki’s eyes. “We can’t keep beating ourselves up. We can’t distance ourselves from each other, from the truth. Sooner or later, we’re going to have to grieve and then once we do that, we have to move on.” 

 

Loki’s green eyes stared back at you. “It’s what she would have wanted.” 

 

You stood and held out a hand, Loki took it. “We never decided.” 

 

“Decided?” Loki raised an eyebrow. 

 

“Astrid or Frigga.” You clarified. 

 

Loki stared at the broken remnants of the crib. “Astrid. It means strong, and she would have had to be strong to put up with us."

 

“I can’t wait to see you, Astrid.” You set the christening gown on the floor. 

 

Loki squeezed your hand as the two of you stared solemnly at the residue of the nursery. 


End file.
